Author:James Holland
'James Holland is the best of the new generation of WW2 historians.' Sebastian Faulks
'Holland's skill lies in bringing these warriors to life with vivid prose.' The Times
Shortlisted for the 2021 British Army Military Book of the Year
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This is the story of the biggest seaborne landing in history.
Codenamed Operation HUSKY, the assault on Sicily on 10 July 1943 remains the largest amphibious invasion ever mounted. That day, over 160,000 Allied troops were dropped from the sky or came ashore to begin the fight for Europe.
The subsequent thirty-eight-day Battle for Sicily was one of the most dramatic of the entire war, involving daring raids by special forces, deals with the Mafia, attacks across mosquito-infested plains and perilous assaults up almost sheer faces of rock and scree.
Made worse by virulent disease and extreme heat, the Allies also had to fight their way across an island of unforgiving landscape and limited infrastructure against a German foe who would not give up.
Victory would signal the beginning of the end of the War in the West. From here on, the noose began to tighten around the neck of Nazi Germany. The coalition between the United States and Britain finally came of age. And it was a crucial dry run for Operation OVERLORD, the invasion of Normandy on D-Day a year later.
Marshalling a wealth of primary and secondary sources into an engrossing narrative, Holland fills a yawning gap in histories of WWII. This magisterial account is a must-read for military history fans.
—— Publishers WeeklyPerfect territory for a military historian of Holland's talents
—— The TimesHistorians too often neglect that emotional tapestry. War is characterised as arrows on a map, tables of munitions, cold casualty statistics. Holland's skill lies in bringing these warriors to life with vivid prose. He's a prolific historian of the war, but each book is constructed with great care and emotional commitment...Holland is obsessed with war, but fortunately does not seem to love it. He recognises its beauty, but also its vileness
—— The TimesHolland argues very effectively that the success of Husky was a turning point in the war
—— Times Literary SupplementHolland makes the capture of the island one of the great turning-point battles of the war
—— Military History MattersJames Holland delivers the account in his usual engaging style and supplements it with excellent pictures and maps
—— Soldier MagazineRevelatory
—— BBC History ExtraBrilliantly blending his historical fact with vivid personal testimony by participants, Holland makes a persuasive case for the conquest of Sicily as a turning-point in the war
—— Daily MailA pleasure to read. The portrait of Napoleon as scientist, scholar, soldier, savant and grubby-fingered gardener is fresh and tremendously enjoyable. Scurr's sharp perception opens new vistas in the extensive landscape of Napoleon's boundlessly curious mind
—— Sue Prideaux, author of I Am Dynamite! A Life of Friedrich NietzscheIf you read just one biography this year, make it Ruth Scurr's brilliant and original exploration of Napoleon's life as an amateur gardener. Everything makes sense once you realise this was a man obsessed with making Nature go his way
—— Amanda ForemanA strikingly original account of Napoleon's life
—— Constance Craig Smith , Daily MailJust when you might think there is no more to say about Napoleon, Ruth Scurr, with her characteristic originality, has found a new way to tell his astonishing story: not through revolution or war, but through the gardens he made wherever he went. It's another wonderfully sideways take on a well-known life
—— Stella TillyardA quirky portrait from the biographer of Robespierre
—— Sunday Times *the Books of 2021*In this unusual and innovative biography published to mark the 200th anniversary of its subject's death, Scurr tells the story of Napoleon through his relationship with nature, particularly the gardens that featured in his life, from Corsica to Saint Helena. A vividly human portrait of a figure who has in the last two centuries become more myth than man
—— Charlie Connelly , New EuropeanRuth Scurr gives us a captivating, original perspective on a man too often simplified as a glorious - or vainglorious - emperor on horseback. Her sparkling book reminds us of Napoleon's human frailties and, above all, that he was also a man of science fascinated by the order, diversity and richness of the plant world. The origins of modern warfare and of the botanical sciences were fused in this man
—— Peter McPhee, author of Liberty or Death: The French RevolutionFrom Napoleon's first garden as a schoolboy to his last, on St. Helena, Ruth Scurr takes us on a journey filled with unexpected new vistas on a familiar life. Napoleon: A Life in Gardens and Shadows foregrounds his passion for science and love of the natural world. The result is a refreshing, engaging read
—— Victoria Johnson, Pulitzer Prize finalist and author of American EdenIt is hard to find fresh things to say about Napoleon, but Ruth Scurr has managed it. Tracing his engagement with gardens and plants from his boyhood in Corsica to his final years on St. Helena, she reveals a neglected side to the great soldier and emperor. No one interested in Napoleon will fail to discover here something unknown or unexpected
—— William Doyle, author of The Oxford History of the French RevolutionI am desperate to see Ruth Scurr's book about Napoleon . . . it has a glorious conceit. Napoleon is seen through his relationship with gardens, and this feline, stalking approach creates a life of an icon which manages to be different
—— Scotland on SundayBoth beautifully written, as well as being a delight, both to botanists, horticulturalists, silvologists and, last but not least, Napoleonists
—— Paul Joyce , ArbuturianThe Napoleonic bibliography is a vast and sprawling thing. Nevertheless, Ruth Scurr . . found an unsuspected gap and has ingeniously filled it with a portrait of Napoleon-as-horticulturist . . . Scurr tracks his rise and fall through his gardens - places of ease in a life of frantic activity
—— Michael Prodger , New StatesmanStimulating and highly original
—— Tony Barber , Financial Times, *Summer Reads of 2021*A fascinating exploration of the Emperor's horticultural interests
—— Sudhir Hazareesingh , Times Literary Supplement, *Summer Reads of 2021*A totally enjoyable work and highly original
—— Tablet, *Summer Reads of 202*A beautifully written account of Napoleon's interaction with horticulture
—— History Today, *Books of the Year*An informative sidelight on the life of the dictator, ranging widely across the intellectual and botanical background of the period
—— Sunday Telegraph, *Books of the Year*Less a biography...than a study of 18th-century horticulture...Scurr's erudition and ear for anecdote ensure it's a delightful ramble
—— Daily Telegraph[A] thoughtful narrative... filling the yawning gap on bookshop shelves between a growing number of modern German history texts and the oversupply of Nazi studies that end in Hitler's bunker
—— Irish TimesAftermath takes in the immediate postwar years where Germany was administered by the Allies... Jähner excels
—— Giles MacDonogh, Financial TimesFascinating... Books about Word War II continue to spill out by the ton, but there has been less attention paid to how Germans coped with the country's shameful Nazi past after the conflict was over
—— Irish Independent (Summer Reads)Rarely has a non-fiction book so skilfully combined vividness, drama and eloquence.
—— From the Jury's reasoning for the Leipzig Book Fair Prize for Non-Fiction 2019Jähner's gripping 500-page X-ray-vision tale of an often overlooked and misperceived phase of German history reveals, like all great history books, as much about the first decade after the war as about today.
—— The German TimesClearly written, full of empathy for everyday life, which is far too seldom taken into consideration... You devour it like a novel.
—— Welt am SonntagA popular work of non-fiction in the best sense.
—— Die Zeit